Marathon County sheriff’s captain Greg Bean declined to answer multiple requests for comment, but told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that the large police presence was called in because law enforcement officials expected they would have to seize large equipment.

See, this is our fault. I don't think any of us realized that SWAT teams moonlight as large-format moving companies. I always thought they were for things involving tactics more complicated than the tactics of getting a tractor onto the hitch of a Mack truck. But, hey, what do I know? I'm sure Mr. Bean isn't prone to saying super ridiculous stuff or anything. So how about that BearCat?

“I’ve been involved in about five standoff situations where, as soon as the MARV showed up, the person gives up,” Bean told the Journal Sentinel.

I don't think the fact that the BearCat makes your job super easy to do is the proper justification for its deployment. If it was, why bother with the BearCat? Why not just bring the perp's mother to the scene and threaten to put a bullet through her head if perp doesn't give up immediately. Sure, it would be wholly unethical and inappropriate, but I bet Bean could still use the quote above, so all's good, yes?

This is yet another obvious and gross misuse of tactical and/or military-grade equipment in a haphazard way. Hoeppner owes Stettin, his city of 2500 residents, $80,000 in fines for not keeping his property as clean as the city would like. In other words, he left his tractors out. As a result, he faced down a BearCat and a SWAT team, which then escorted him to the bank where he paid his fines and was escorted back out by SWAT. All of this because the authorities couldn't be bothered to come up with a creative way to get Hoeppner out of his house.

“I just don’t understand why a dollar and a half of postage on an envelope that I would have had to pick up at the Wausau post office wouldn’t have done the same thing as 24 officers and an armored vehicle,” Hoeppner told the Guardian. “The United States is not supposed to terrorize its hardworking people."

Good one, sir.

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]]>tanks-for-nothinghttps://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20141030/07262928986Mon, 22 Sep 2014 12:18:34 PDTSeventh Circuit Court Upholds Fair Use Win, But Does So With Some Convoluted Reasoning And Bad AssumptionsTim Cushinghttps://www.techdirt.com/articles/20140920/09013328588/seventh-circuit-court-upholds-fair-use-win-does-so-with-some-convoluted-reasoning-bad-assumptions.shtml
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20140920/09013328588/seventh-circuit-court-upholds-fair-use-win-does-so-with-some-convoluted-reasoning-bad-assumptions.shtmlfair use, courtesy of the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. There's some history behind the disputed derivative artwork, but that history -- while illuminating -- has nothing to do with the plaintiff or defendants. It does, however, explain why this item came to be, and is integral enough that the Court's decision recounts it during its very brief confirmation of the lower court's decision. [pdf link]

While a student at the University of Wisconsin in 1969, Paul Soglin attended the first Mifflin Street Block Party, whose theme (according to Soglin) was “taking a sharp stick and poking it in the eye of authority.” Now in his seventh term as Mayor of Madison, Wisconsin, Soglin does not appreciate being on the pointy end. He wants to shut down the annual event. For the 2012 Block Party, Sconnie Nation made some t-shirts and tank tops displaying an image of Soglin’s face and the phrase “Sorry for Partying.” The 54 sales, on which Sconnie Nation cleared a small profit, led to this suit, in which photographer Michael Kienitz accuses Sconnie Nation and its vendor of copyright infringement.

The original photo, which was taken by Kienitz and downloaded from Soglin's website, is shown below, along with Sconnie Nation's t-shirt design.

Sconnie Nation admitted that the photo from the site was the starting point, so there's no question the rights belong to the photographer. But the photographer also admitted that he "gave" the photo to Soglin to use on his website (rather than licensed) and make freely available for download. These facts don't necessarily excuse the alleged infringement when applying the four-factor Fair Use test, as the court does here.

There’s no good reason why defendants should be allowed to appropriate someone else’s copyrighted efforts as the starting point in their lampoon, when so many non-­copyrighted alternatives (including snapshots they could have taken themselves) were available. The fair-­use privilege under §107 is not designed to protect lazy appropriators.

As the court points out, the fair use protection for parody exists to prevent copyright owners from shutting down any uses that might make them (or their subjects) look less than dignified (something the photographer promised to his subjects despite having no legal way to prevent situations like this from occurring).

But the fact that the appropriators could have started anywhere doesn't make this infringement (even if the court labors under the misimpression that the world is loaded with copyright-free images). Stacking the t-shirt up against the other prongs of the Fair Use defense, the Seventh Circuit Court finds the plaintiff's claims wanting.

A t-­shirt or tank top is no substitute for the original photograph. Nor does Kienitz say that defendants disrupted a plan to license this work for apparel. Kienitz does not argue that defendants’ products have reduced the demand for the original work or any use of it that he is contemplating.

The court notes that Kienitz could have claimed that this lampooning would diminish photographic work for other dignitaries, seeing as he promised to keep their dignity intact when licensing, but those claims were never raised during this case's trip through the court system.

The court also points out that significant transformation took place during its trip from the website to Nation's t-shirt. The original photo was stripped of its background, was "posterized," re-colored and altered enough that the defendants could have achieved the same effect by "using a snapshot taken on the street." The court notes that the defendants made a small profit (which doesn't instantly negate a Fair Use defense -- although the court's wording here seems to indicate it does) but that is mitigated by the "political purposes" of the design. And even if Kienitz had decided to claim that the parodic work would harm his photography business in the future, the court says that "by the time the defendants were done, almost none of the copyrighted work remained."

While "lazy appropriators" were smacked around a little, and the false assumption that making money negates Fair Use defenses was given a little credence, it's another win for transformative creations, even if it's one that is skewed to statutory factors rather than the concept of fair use itself.

The decision is also a bit strange in the fact that it points out the significant transformation of the original Soglin photo, while at the same time dismissing the transformative use arguments raised by the Supreme Court (Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music) and the much broader Second Circuit Court decision in Cariou v. Prince. The judge raises both cases by name but then points out that "transformative use" isn't one of the four factors under consideration and posits that entertaining the Cariou defense could undermine rights holders' control over derivative works.

The Second Circuit has run with the suggestion and concluded that “transformative use” is enough to bring a modified copy within the scope of §107. See, e.g., Cariou v. Prince, 714 F.3d 694, 706 (2d Cir. 2013). Cariou applied this to an example of “appropriation art,” in which some of the supposed value comes from the very fact that the work was created by someone else.

We’re skeptical of Cariou’s approach, because asking exclusively whether something is “transformative” not only replaces the list in §107 but also could override 17 U.S.C. §106(2), which protects derivative works. To say that a new use transforms the work is precisely to say that it is derivative and thus, one might suppose, protected under §106(2). Cariou and its predecessors in the Second Circuit do not explain how every “transformative use” can be “fair use” without extinguishing the author’s rights under §106(2).

By making this argument, the court conflates two distinct terms -- transformative use and derivative works (Section 106(2)) -- making transformative use slightly weaker, at least in this venue. Instead, the court focuses on the four statutory defenses, mainly those that could negatively affect the creator's future earnings. In doing so, it arrives at the correct conclusion, but leaves a muddied blueprint in its wake for future rulings to follow.

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]]>desire-to-mock-politicians-largely-unaffectedhttps://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20140920/09013328588Tue, 10 Jun 2014 15:59:52 PDTWisconsin Court Broadens FOI Exception, Allowing Government Agencies To Deny Requests Based On Perceived MotiveTim Cushinghttps://www.techdirt.com/articles/20140526/09082627363/wisconsin-court-broadens-foi-exception-allowing-government-agencies-to-deny-requests-based-perceived-motive.shtml
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20140526/09082627363/wisconsin-court-broadens-foi-exception-allowing-government-agencies-to-deny-requests-based-perceived-motive.shtml
An interesting -- and possibly harmful -- ruling on public records requests has just been issued by the Wisconsin Court of Appeals. Although the ruling has a very limited jurisdiction, it could be used to push for similar legal activity elsewhere. Journalism student David Schick (who was last seen drawing the ire of Georgia State Attorney General Sam Olens over the release of public documents) has the story.

According the the appeal, “[Korry] Ardell has not aligned himself with the general class of persons (emphasis added)” that make records requests to ensure government transparency.

How did Korry Ardell get himself excluded from the "general class of persons?" By being generally abusive and violent, it would appear. The person whose records he was seeking had previously obtained a restraining order against Ardell -- something he had violated in the past, leading to a six-month visit to a local correctional facility.

The decision groups Ardell with others who are denied access to public records -- namely, prisoners. But Ardell's time had been served and he was no longer incarcerated when the request was made. Ardell's previous willingness to violate court orders does seem to give him a higher-than-normal chance for recidivism, something the court also took into account when rendering this decision.

Ardell disagrees with this conclusion and argues that Levin v. Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System, 2003 WI App 181, 266 Wis. 2d 481, 668 N.W.2d 779, stands for the proposition that identity is never a proper consideration when determining whether information should be released under the Wisconsin open records law. Citing WIS. STAT. § 19.32(3), Ardell asserts that the only exception to this hard-and-fast rule is for committed and incarcerated persons.

Indeed, Levin stands for the general proposition “that the identity and purpose of the requester of public records is not a part of the balancing test to be applied in determining whether to release records.” Id., 266 Wis. 2d 481, ¶14. However, as we set forth above, the determination of whether there is a safety concern that outweighs the presumption of disclosure is a fact-intensive inquiry that we determine on a case-by-case basis…

Ardell’s violent history with the MBSD employee, including his two convictions for violations of the domestic abuse injunction, align him more closely with the class of persons statutorily denied access to public records for safety reasons, that is, committed and incarcerated persons. See WIS. STAT. § 19.32(3). Ardell has forfeited his right to disclosure of the MBSD employee’s employment records by demonstrating an intent to hurt the employee, and it would be contrary to common sense and public policy to permit him to use the open records law to continue his course of intimidation and harassment.

While the decision does appear to make sense in this situation, it opens up the possibility of future request denials based on the requester's personal background, or the responding agency's perception of the requester's motive. ("Mosaictheory," anyone?) The court states that this will be determined on a "case-by-case basis," but that's a potentially expensive remedy that not every requester will be able to avail themselves of. This has the potential to route more requests through the Wisconsin court system, aligning this state with the US government itself, which seems to prefer legal battles to transparency.

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]]>as-if-government-agencies-need-any-more-excuseshttps://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20140526/09082627363Mon, 8 Jul 2013 07:21:12 PDTNSA Recruiters Get Smacked Down By University Of Wisconsin StudentsTim Cushinghttps://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130704/12162223721/nsa-recruiters-get-smacked-down-university-wisconsin-students.shtml
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130704/12162223721/nsa-recruiters-get-smacked-down-university-wisconsin-students.shtml
I'm not sure what the NSA recruiters were expecting when they made a recruiting trip to the University of Wisconsin, but I'm sure the following wasn't it. Maybe they thought they wouldn't be challenged. The sort of students looking to work with the NSA would presumably have had a healthy deference to authority drilled into them since an early age. Maybe they thought that any challenges could be waved away with a simple refusal for "security reasons." Maybe they thought the attending instructor would attempt to moderate the discussion.

None of that happened.

The student who transcribed the recording of the recruiters' visit thought there might be a bit more discussion about current events, and how Snowden's actions had affected recruiting and the agency itself. Instead, more time was spent trying to paint the NSA employees as a fun-loving bunch who spy all day before heading out to blow off steam getting drunk, wearing costumes and singing karaoke. (I am not making this up.)

One of the recruiters discussed how they tend to socialize after work, dressing up in costumes and getting drunk (referenced below). I can imagine that also exerts a lot of social pressure and works as a kind of social closure from which it would be difficult to escape.

Yes, NSA agents are human beings and will relax like other humans do once off the clock. There's nothing wrong with that, but the recruiters seemed unwilling to be dragged into a discussion of the actual "job," and the repercussions of the work they do. Instead of meeting the questions head on, they both made the rather poor decision to play word games with linguistic students.

Student A (female): I have a lifestyle question that you seem to be selling. It sounds more like acolonial expedition. You know the “globe is our playground” is the words you used, the phrasing that you used and you seem to be saying that you can do your work. You can analyze said documents for your so-called customers but then you can go and get drunk and dress up and have fun without thinking of the repercussions of the info you’re analyzing has on the rest of the world. I also want to know what are the qualifications that one needs to become a whistleblower because that sounds like a much more interesting job. And I think the Edward Snowdens and the Bradley Mannings and Julian Assanges of the world will prevail ultimately.

NSA_M: I’m not sure what the –

Me: The question here is do you actually think about the ramifications of the work that you do, which is deeply problematic, or do you just dress up in costumes and get drunk?

...

NSA_M: We take it very seriously that when we give info to our policy makers that we do give it to them in the right context so that they can make the best decision with the best info available.

Student B: Is that what Clapper was doing when he perjured himself in front of Congress? Was he giving accurate information when he said we do not collect any intelligence on the US citizens that it’s only occasionally unintentionally or was he perjuring himself when he made a statement before Congress under oath that he later declared to be erroneous or at least, untruthful the least truthful answer? How do you feel personally having a boss whose comfortable perjuring himself in front of Congress?

NSA_F: Our director is not general Clapper.

Student B: General Alexander also lied in front of Congress.

NSA_F: I don’t know about that.

Student B: Probably because access to the Guardian is restricted on the NSA’s computers. I am sure they don’t encourage people like you to actually think about these things.

…

Me: Right, but you’re here recruiting so you’re selling the organization. I mean I’m less interested in what your specialized role is within in the NSA. I don’t care. The fact is you’re here presenting a public face for the NSA and you’re trying to sell the organization to people that are as young as high schoolers and trying to tell us that this is an attractive option in a context in which we clearly know that the NSA has been telling us complete lies. So, I’m wondering is that a qualification? [ref. to earlier question: "So, this is a job for liars?"]

NSA_F: I don’t believe the NSA is telling complete lies. And I do believe that you know, people can, you can read a lot of different things that are portrayed as fact and that doesn’t make them fact just because they’re in newspapers.

Who knows what song you have to belt out to shake off something like this, but whatever it was, I'm sure recruiters M and F were at least a half-dozens sheets to the wind when they did it. It's tough to find a fiery, angst-unloading track written from the perspective of The Man, so perhaps they settled for a quiet duet of Radiohead's "Fitter, Happier," a song most normal people don't find aspirational.

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]]>work-for-the-nation's-most-hated-employer!https://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20130704/12162223721Tue, 6 Nov 2012 11:02:46 PSTWisconsin Warns: If You Tweet Photos Of Your Completed Ballot, You Can Go To JailMike Masnickhttps://www.techdirt.com/articles/20121106/09260420947/wisconsin-warns-if-you-tweet-photos-your-completed-ballot-you-can-go-to-jail.shtml
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20121106/09260420947/wisconsin-warns-if-you-tweet-photos-your-completed-ballot-you-can-go-to-jail.shtmlall those local laws concerning camera usage inside a polling place are some that could cause trouble for people doing something quite ordinary. For example, it appears that people in Wisconsin who decide to Instagram/Tweet/Facebook an image of their ballots, have committed a class I felony, election fraud. And this doesn't appear to just be a law that the state is going to ignore either. It's been issuing warnings to people that they could face felony charges if they do post those photos. Undoubtedly, many will be unaware that they're committing election fraud when they thought they were just showing civic pride. One hopes that officials in Wisconsin, and other states, take the context into account before moving forward with any legal responses.

By the way, StumbleUpon can also recommend some good Techdirt articles, too.

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]]>urls-we-dig-uphttps://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20120502/19393018749Mon, 29 Aug 2011 11:16:18 PDTFederal Court Invents A New Intellectual Property Right: The Money Makes It So Exclusive Right To RecordMike Masnickhttps://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110826/15450015708/federal-court-invents-new-intellectual-property-right-money-makes-it-so-exclusive-right-to-record.shtml
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110826/15450015708/federal-court-invents-new-intellectual-property-right-money-makes-it-so-exclusive-right-to-record.shtmlexclusive broadcaster for high school sporting events in the state. The Gannett newspapers challenged this by streaming four different events online, eventually leading to this lawsuit. There were other highly questionable limitations on news media, including a claim that they could not even report play-by-play data. That part is the most ridiculous, as that seems like a clear violation on free speech rights, and also goes against previous caselaw that has allowed the reporting of factual game information. But, stunningly, last year, a district court judge ruled that commerce trumps the First Amendment, and since the WIAA needs to make money, such deals are just fine. This didn't make much sense to us, and we hoped that it would be overturned on appeal.

No such luck.

Ima Fish alerts us to the appeals court ruling which upheld the lower court and seems to endorse the creation of a wholly made up new form of intellectual property right that has no basis in the law. The court clearly says that this is not a copyright case, so copyright law doesn't apply. So what right exactly is WIAA granting to its broadcasting partner? That's not clear at all from the ruling. If it's not copyright, it appears to be something entirely made up by the appeals court, which might be loosely defined as "the right to make up restrictions if it makes money." I'm not joking. The court repeatedly focuses in on the idea that the WIAA needs to make money, and that somehow makes it okay to grant a single company an exclusive license.

I don't see how this makes much sense. I could see that they should be allowed to grant a license to an "official" broadcaster, and even give them additional access, but I don't see how they can stop someone else from recording the material and broadcasting it as well -- especially when they admit that it's not a copyright issue.

And since this new exclusive made up imaginary right has no basis in law, we don't know what any exceptions are. Is there a fair use exception like in copyright? The contract says other agencies can show two minutes of streaming video from events, but it doesn't need to say that, and fair use shouldn't be determined by a contract anyway. The whole thing seems bizarre and troubling, in that it seems to suggest that public entities can create a special kind of exclusive broadcast intellectual property right if they use it to make money.

Separately, one small part of the case struck me as interesting in relation to a different case we talked about recently. In the Zediva case, we thought it was ridiculous that the court declared a paid video broadcast to your home as a public performance because the Zediva service was offered to "the public." Yet, in this case, the court insists that sporting events at public schools (which are open to the public) are, in fact, "nonpublic forums." I don't think either description makes sense. A private home is a private place. A public sporting event is a public event.

Finally, the court seems to totally overstate the situation in the ruling here and suggests a clear misunderstanding of the public domain:

The logical implications of Gannett’s argument are breathtaking. Suppose a high-school orchestra were to perform one of Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos or the drama club put together a rendition of Othello (both of which are in the public domain). Gannett’s argument would require the conclusion that the students have no right to engage in the common practice of packaging their performance and selling it to raise money for school trips.

While some of Gannett's arguments may have risen to that level (it did suggest that public institutions shouldn't be able to make money this way), the court also seems to suggest that just because you can't have exclusivity, you can't make money. That's silly, and wrong.

Gannett is still considering its options, but it can ask for an en banc (full court) review or it can appeal to the Supreme Court. I'm hoping it will fight this, because the ruling seems totally nonsensical.

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]]>wtf?https://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20110826/15450015708Mon, 20 Jun 2011 19:02:50 PDTGiant Breweries Get Laws Passed In Wisconsin To Make Life Hard For Small Breweries [Updated]Mike Masnickhttps://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110619/23410614742/giant-breweries-get-laws-passed-wisconsin-to-make-life-hard-small-breweries.shtml
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110619/23410614742/giant-breweries-get-laws-passed-wisconsin-to-make-life-hard-small-breweries.shtmlkill Wiscnet (which only a very last minute reprieve saved). And now DoggyDork points us to the news of a new law that requires all beer makers, including tiny craft shops, to only sell beer through big middle men. That is, a small craft beer maker can't go to the restaurant down the street and sell its beer. Instead, it has to find a big distributor to sell for it. The article notes that the big beer companies, like MillerCoors, love this bill. But the small guys hate it, because it'll effectively kill off whatever sales they had. The cynical suggest that this is an attempt by the likes of MillerCoors to limit competition from these upstart competitors. Update: There's an informative, if incredibly insult-filled, comment, claiming that the story at ThinkProgress, our original link, is misreporting the details of this bill. That comment suggests that this bill is not quite as bad as they made it sound (and, of course, accuses us of being all sorts of evil for claiming otherwise). Update 2: And... a separate response suggests the explanation in that comment in the first update might not be accurate at all. Good debate going on in the comments.

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]]>small businesses are the backbonehttps://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20110619/23410614742Wed, 15 Jun 2011 15:34:00 PDTWisconsin Kills WiscNet, Because The Only Good Infrastructure Is AT&T InfrastructureMike Masnickhttps://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110614/13195214690/wisconsin-kills-wiscnet-because-only-good-infrastructure-is-att-infrastructure.shtml
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110614/13195214690/wisconsin-kills-wiscnet-because-only-good-infrastructure-is-att-infrastructure.shtmlkill it off by suggesting it was somehow anti-free market:

Yet, just when other states in the country are scrambling to invest in network infrastructure to help their universities rise to meet the international research and education challenge, this legislation could essentially disconnect Wisconsin from the global research it now leads. The result would be devastating. As the only intensive research institution in the United States that would be barred from participating in its own networks, Wiscnet and Internet2, the University, with respect to the ability to participate in global research, would become an immediate equivalent of a third-world University.

AT&T's ability to crush any and all public Wisconsin broadband benefit projects would be slightly-less obxnoxious if AT&T was providing the kind of infrastructure that made all of these projects unnecessary, but they're simply not. AT&T connectivity in many parts of Wisconsin consists of over-priced T1s, and lawmakers there are more than happy to write laws protecting AT&T ability to not only over charge for outdated infrastructure, but ensuring that connectivity-strained communities have no alternatives. Wisconsin's AT&T-run government is the future for all states without serious U.S. political reform, and the result will inevitably be disastrous for the future of cutting-edge connectivity.

We see this all too often in the telco world. If there were real competition, this probably wouldn't be an issue. But so many telcos seem to focus on making sure that they're the only game in town, creating a monopoly -- which is a real "free market" problem. Contrary to what people are saying, this isn't a "free market" issue, this is an issue of regulatory capture, leading to diminished infrastructure.

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]]>infrastructurehttps://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20110614/13195214690Mon, 18 Apr 2011 10:53:12 PDTWisconsin County That 'Found' Lost Votes Apparently Has Major Voting Irregularities For Years...Mike Masnickhttps://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110415/23002413918/wisconsin-county-that-found-lost-votes-apparently-has-major-voting-irregularities-years.shtml
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110415/23002413918/wisconsin-county-that-found-lost-votes-apparently-has-major-voting-irregularities-years.shtmlfound 14,000 votes in a recent (highly contested) election, after the very partisan County Clerk -- who had just been questioned for questionable methods of collecting election data -- said that she had "failed to save the results" in her original report. While this followup story is now about a week old, someone just sent it over to us. Apparently that particular county, Waukesha County, has a rather stunning history of voting irregularities, including having an astounding and totally unprecedented 97.63% voter turnout rate in 2004:

Apparently in 2004 the polls in Waukesha were teeming with voters as the Waukesha County Clerk's office showed a 97.63% turn out. No, that's not a typo. 97.63%

Of the 236,642 registered voters in Waukesha on Nov 2, 2004 apparently 231,031 of them came out in a hint of rain and drizzle and did their civic duty.

Just to put this in perspective, Australia has compulsory (mandatory) voting and their turnout is 95%.

And it's not just voter turnout that's suspiciously high. Voter registrations are unprecedented as well:

In the 8 months leading into the 2004 Presidential Election there was a marginal 1.3% increase in the rolls netting about 3000 additional new voters. However in the 3 months after the election, which showed an anomalous 97.63% turn out, suddenly the rolls surged to the tune of almost 50,000 new voters and upped the rolls 20%. I suppose that's one way to even out a suspiciously high turn out.

Furthermore, remember that first number I told you to hang on to? The 283,820 eligible voters in the county of Waukesha in July of 2004? This new surge in the voter rolls has now pushed total voter registration in Waukesha County to 99.5% of elegible voters being registered to vote by February of 2005.

99.5% of eligible voters registered? Wow.

But, let's not stop there. The blogger who did this research also dug up the official election results data from the 2006 election in Waukesha County, and noticed that some of the elections appeared to have more votes than ballots were cast by a fairly large number:

In the race for Governor/Lieutenant Governor there were a total of 176,112 votes cast. For Attorney General there were a total of 174,047 votes cast. And for Secretary of State there were a total 170,440 votes cast.

So, look at the 3rd line of the top of that report...Total Ballots Cast: 156,804. So based on those numbers 20,000 extra votes were cast in the election that weren't actually accounted for in the ballots cast.

To say the least, these numbers are pretty troubling if you believe in the integrity of democratic elections.

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]]>well,-look-at-thathttps://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20110415/23002413918Fri, 8 Apr 2011 12:45:31 PDT14,000 'Unsaved' Votes Suddenly 'Found' In Wisconsin?Mike Masnickhttps://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110408/01441913818/14000-unsaved-votes-suddenly-found-wisconsin.shtml
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110408/01441913818/14000-unsaved-votes-suddenly-found-wisconsin.shtml
The original results showed a very slight victory for Kloppenburg. Now, I generally avoid mentioning political parties of politicians entirely, because I find that it leads to partisan debates, which are effectively religious debates, rather than debates on the actual issues. But, here, the parties become a bit more important. Because of the highly partisan battle in Wisconsin involving a Republican Governor and Democratic elected officials, many people viewed this election as something of a proxy, with Prosser representing the "Republican" viewpoint and Kloppenburg being the hope of the "Democrats." That's a bit of a simplification, but to get to the point we're talking about here, it's enough.

With the voting results being incredibly close -- the original count had Kloppenburg with a 204 vote margin of victory, out of over 1.4 million votes cast -- it's no surprise that a "recount" has been underway, with small numbers of votes turning up here or there. However, what's turning some heads is the fact that the County Clerk in Waukesha County, Kathy Nickolaus, suddenly found 14,315 votes, with the vast majority (by a margin of 7,582) that didn't make the initial count. She claims that they weren't counted because she "failed to save the results" in the computer system. She also said that this kind of "human error" is "common in this process."

Assuming this is actually true, it seems like a pretty clear case that Nickolaus should not be in the job any more, as that's a pretty clear case of incompetence in a rather important job. Assuming it's not true... well... that's a whole different story. Of course, complicating matters is the fact that Nickolaus is apparently an active Republican and was at the center of a few former controversies, including one about election data and how Nickolaus would collect election results -- with people raising concerns months ago about "the integrity of the system." It seems that she decided "to take the election data collection and storage system off the county's computer network - and keep it on stand-alone personal computers accessible only in her office." Now, her argument, which is not entirely unreasonable, is that it's better to keep such data off the network, but given the specific concerns raised, the story is raising eyebrows.

Obviously, for folks who are die-hard supporters of either party, they can spin the story in either direction. But, if we just take a step back, and look at it from the standpoint of wanting to believe in the concepts of basic democracy, shouldn't we all be pretty concerned that any voting system, no matter how it's set up or maintained, could lead to this sort of situation where 14,000 potentially crucial votes could go completely missing without notice... and then magically turn up just as they're needed?

Even if everything is legit, and there's no compelling reason not to assume that's the case at this point, it certainly hurts the basic integrity of the election system. And that's pretty important if you want people to actually believe in the basic principles of democracy. And, honestly, why do we let any single person, especially one with a clear party affiliation, control such data? At the very least, it should be in the hands of either neutral parties, or multiple people who can see each other's actions.

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]]>funny-how-that-workshttps://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20110408/01441913818Wed, 31 Mar 2010 02:03:00 PDTIs Buying A Google Ad On Your Competitors' Name A Privacy Violation?Mike Masnickhttps://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100316/0234188578.shtml
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100316/0234188578.shtmlclaiming that it's a violation of Wisconsin state privacy laws to buy keywords based on the names of the partners in the firm. It's difficult to see who's privacy is being violated here. And, of course, to make the case a bit more exciting, the defendants surprised everyone in court by doing a search on YellowPages.com for their own law firm -- and having an ad for the plaintiff show up. So, now the defendants are claiming that the plaintiffs have "unclean hands," since they appear to be doing the exact same thing they've accused the defendants of doing. It sounds like quite a trial...

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]]>only-in-the-world-of-lawyershttps://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20100316/0234188578Tue, 9 Jun 2009 15:34:00 PDTDear People Offended By Books; Requesting Permission To Burn Them Will Drive More Attention To ThemMike Masnickhttps://www.techdirt.com/articles/20090609/1219065178.shtml
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20090609/1219065178.shtmlpetitioning the local library for permission to burn its only copy of a book called Baby Be-Bop. A book burning? Apparently it hasn't occurred to these offended folks that (beyond the disgrace of wanting to burn books they dislike), this entire action has only served to call a lot more attention to that book. The folks asking for the right to burn the book, are also demanding $120,000 for "being exposed to the book in a library display," which seems likely to (again) only drive much more interest in the book. A book that can cause that much damage? Where can I get my copy?

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]]>that's-not-what-you-wanthttps://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20090609/1219065178Mon, 3 Nov 2008 15:29:03 PSTHow A School Board In Wisconsin (And The NYC Subway System) Became Accidental Hedge FundsMike Masnickhttps://www.techdirt.com/articles/20081103/0238422716.shtml
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20081103/0238422716.shtmlhedge funds -- despite not really knowing how to do that. That is, they took on much greater risks and higher leverage, without having much of an understanding of how to really hedge that risk. That was fine when all was going well, but when the bubble burst, it started impacting everyone.

Now, in a combined effort between NPR's Planet Money (I know I've said this, but I'll say it again: if you're not listening to this every day, you're missing out, big time) and the NY Times, reports are coming out about how it went well beyond banks turning into hedge funds, to all sorts of other organizations as well. The scary example being described in the first article in this series is how a Wisconsin school board and the NYC subway system, both effectively became hedge funds, lending money out to various banks in exchange for CDOs (collateralized debt obligations). What a CDO is, effectively, is the mashing together of a variety of different debt instruments (loans) that pay out some sort of return. So, you could basically buy some of the return on a whole mess of loans, packaged in all different ways (some amazingly creatively).

If all of those debt instruments that you're buying into keep on paying, you're in good shape. If, however, there are defaults, you can be in an awful lot of trouble. However, while everything was going great, defaults weren't an issue and the folks sold on these CDOs often had no idea how risky they really were. In the article above, for example, the guy who sold the Wisconsin school district on investing $200 million of its pension money in CDOs had only taken a two hour course on them, and greatly downplayed the risks.

And, of course, to make matters even worse, in many cases, the actual risks of such CDOs were hidden through some games, and made worse by either clueless or complicit ratings agencies which rated seriously high risk CDOs as being extremely safe bets. To see a rather graphic (and easily understandable) example of this, I recommend the following Paddy Hirsch video comparing CDOs to pyramids of champagne glasses:

The really scary part was that, effectively, you had numerous less than fully sophisticated investors, dumping hundreds of millions, if not billions, of dollars into incredibly complex investment vehicles that they were being falsely told were extremely safe, when the facts are that they were highly risky. Many pension funds and the like allocate a certain small percentage of their investments into high risk vehicles -- but the financial crisis is being caused in part by the realization that a much, much, much larger percentage of their investments actually turned out to be in seriously high risk vehicles, many of which have now defaulted.

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]]>the-obfuscation-of-riskhttps://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20081103/0238422716Fri, 8 Feb 2008 13:27:45 PSTCan A Newspaper Survive By Only Printing Twice A Week?Mike Masnickhttps://www.techdirt.com/articles/20080208/000422207.shtml
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20080208/000422207.shtmlRomenesko points out that the Madison Capital Times, in Wisconsin, is not just putting more emphasis on its internet operations, but it's also cutting back on the print paper to the point of only coming out with a printed paper twice a week. Reader Joel also sent this in, saying: "A newspaper's web site gets its credibility from the daily publication. Without that it's just another news web site, and anyone can put up a web site. I think they need a reputable daily publication, even if it sells poorly and loses a little money, to give the web site legitimacy." I mostly agree, though, if you can successfully do news just online, paper could be a pretty big waste. However, in this case, it's unclear what benefit the "twice-a-week" strategy really provides. It will probably upset those who really liked reading the physical paper each day, and will do little to attract new readership. If they wanted to really bet on the web, why not make the bet complete? Going halfway by making the paper version less valuable doesn't seem all that compelling.